In last week’s poll, we said that Samsung probably looked at usage statistics before deciding to axe the remote control functionality from the S Pen on the Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra – well, maybe they should have had another look. Admittedly, our readers are more tech savvy than regular smartphone owners and more likely to be power users. With that in mind, a worrying number of voters in the poll are going to miss the remote features.
Reading through the comments, many consider the remote shutter function something that comes in handy once in a while. Others feel more strongly about it, saying that this Bluetooth-based functionality is what made the S Pen special (other styluses usually limit themselves to pressure sensitivity and an eraser function).
Either way, it’s clear that two-thirds of voters use the S Pen remote functions at least sometimes and will miss them if they upgrade to an S25 Ultra.
Again, voters here are more likely to be power users, but if you brand a device as “Ultra”, you shouldn’t be surprised when people expect it to be a best-of-the-best, no-compromises phone. Especially when said phone carries a $1,300/€1,470 price tag.
Samsung may be thinking of removing the S Pen entirely – that was always more of a Galaxy Note feature than a Galaxy S one. Alas, the Note series is no more. Anyway, removing the S Pen could bring some upsides, e.g. a larger battery. But only removing the remote control features is a strict downgrade and that could hurt the Galaxy S25 Ultra in the long run.
That said, the S25 series is off to a strong start and, in South Korea at least, more people ordered the Ultra than those who got an S25 and S25+ put together. We will see if that momentum holds after the pre-order period.
